Exquisite, Disturbing Objects From 500 Years of Human Anatomical Science

Harris P. Mosher lecturing at Harvard Medical School in 1929. The giant skull was made in the 1890s and is part of the new exhibit.

A corrosion cast of the airways, possibly from a rabbit, sheep, or dog. From 1880-1890.

Harvard Dental School student F. E. Sprague created this preparation in 1887 to show off a variety of filling techniques he'd mastered.

A dissection kit, circa 1850. Each tool has a specific purpose. The large tool in the center is a bone saw.

Surgeon and anatomist Edmé François Chauvot de Beauchêne invented a technique for taking apart the individual bones of the skull and reassembling them in a an "exploded" view. This specimen is from around 1880.

A closer look at Chauvot de Beauchêne's "exploded" skull.

This 1610 engraving depicts the anatomy theater at Leiden University, which was built in 1596. Spectators (including the occasional dog, apparently) gathered around the central table where dissections were performed.

In this 1544 anatomical flap print by Heinrich Vogtherr, lifting up paper tabs reveals the underlying anatomy layer by layer.

Detail from the male counterpart to the previous anatomical flap print, with a flap lifted to reveal the intestines.

A 1545 illustration from the French anatomist, Charles Estienne.

A flayed corpse holds his own skin in this page from a 1560 book by anatomist Juan Valverde de Amusco

In this illustration from the first half of the 19th century, the muscles are cut away from the body to reveal the underlying skeleton.

Anatomy and the Christian concept of resurrection mix in this 1523 illustration by Jacopo Berengario da Carpi.

This 1782 engraving by Paul Revere (yes, that Paul Revere) certifies completion of a course of anatomical lectures by John Warren, the first anatomist at Harvard.

In this detail of Revere's engraving, a noose is visible around the cadaver's neck, indicating the body belonged to a condemned prisoner -- and was therefore legally acquired.

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Exquisite, Disturbing Objects From 500 Years of Human Anatomical Science

Harris P. Mosher lecturing at Harvard Medical School in 1929. The giant skull was made in the 1890s and is part of the new exhibit.

A corrosion cast of the airways, possibly from a rabbit, sheep, or dog. From 1880-1890.

Harvard Dental School student F. E. Sprague created this preparation in 1887 to show off a variety of filling techniques he'd mastered.

A dissection kit, circa 1850. Each tool has a specific purpose. The large tool in the center is a bone saw.

Surgeon and anatomist Edmé François Chauvot de Beauchêne invented a technique for taking apart the individual bones of the skull and reassembling them in a an "exploded" view. This specimen is from around 1880.

A closer look at Chauvot de Beauchêne's "exploded" skull.

This 1610 engraving depicts the anatomy theater at Leiden University, which was built in 1596. Spectators (including the occasional dog, apparently) gathered around the central table where dissections were performed.

In this 1544 anatomical flap print by Heinrich Vogtherr, lifting up paper tabs reveals the underlying anatomy layer by layer.

Detail from the male counterpart to the previous anatomical flap print, with a flap lifted to reveal the intestines.

A 1545 illustration from the French anatomist, Charles Estienne.

A flayed corpse holds his own skin in this page from a 1560 book by anatomist Juan Valverde de Amusco

In this illustration from the first half of the 19th century, the muscles are cut away from the body to reveal the underlying skeleton.

Anatomy and the Christian concept of resurrection mix in this 1523 illustration by Jacopo Berengario da Carpi.

This 1782 engraving by Paul Revere (yes, that Paul Revere) certifies completion of a course of anatomical lectures by John Warren, the first anatomist at Harvard.

In this detail of Revere's engraving, a noose is visible around the cadaver's neck, indicating the body belonged to a condemned prisoner -- and was therefore legally acquired.

For centuries people have been simultaneously fascinated by what's inside the human body and squeamish about getting close enough to a cadaver to actually find out. "There's this tension between the desire to know, and what it takes to get that knowledge," said David Jones, a historian of science at Harvard Medical School and one of the curators of a new exhibit on the history of anatomy at Harvard's Collection of Historical Scientific Instruments.

The Body of Knowledge exhibit, which opened last week and runs through December 5, illustrates some of the ways in which people have wrestled with that tension through the ages. Science, culture, and religion have all played a role.

"People have been opening up and breaking apart human bodies for a very, very long time," said Katherine Park, a science historian at Harvard and another of the exhibit's organizers. "But it's meant different things in different times and different places."

(1560).

The science of anatomy may have its roots in the embalming practices of ancient Egypt, Park says. The Egyptians became skilled at dissection through the art of mummification, which included removing the organs of the deceased to preserve them for the afterlife. The ancient Greeks knew of these practices but mostly did their dissections on animals instead of human cadavers for legal and religious reasons.

Medieval Christians routinely extracted organs from the bodies of saints and distributed tiny pieces of them to be used as relics, Park says. "They became magical ritual objects," Park said.

By the 1400s more scientific dissections were being done in university medical schools. But they weren't always somber, strictly educational affairs, like the human anatomy classes taught today. "You have the sense there was a lot of gallows humor going on, a lot of joking when the genitals are dissected," Park said. But much depended on the personality of the anatomy professor, she says. "There seems to have been a lot of horsing around in Bologna. In Padua it was much more serious."

These dissections were cultural spectacles, even tourist attractions. It wasn't uncommon for city leaders to try to impress visiting dignitaries by taking them to see a dissection, Park says.

After the invention of printing, the production of beautifully illustrated anatomical books began to flourish in the 1500s. Anatomists sought out artists to produce these books, and at the same time artists like Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo sought out anatomical knowledge to make their human figures more realistic.

The acquisition of cadavers for dissection has been an uncomfortable issue over the years, and the exhibit doesn't shy away from that, says Dominic Hall, curator of Harvard's Warren Anatomical Museum, one of several institutions that contributed objects to the exhibit. Initially many public dissections used the corpses of executed criminals or of foreigners, the poor, or people who died in hospitals and had no one to claim their body. But demand outstripped supply, and grave robbing became a problem.

In the late 18th and early 19th century, medical schools often required students to procure their own cadaver for anatomy class, says Jones. "There was a famous case in London, where medical students attacked a funeral procession, knocked over the pall bearers, and grabbed the cadaver, and ran for it," he said. An angry mob gave chase. "It was a very uncomfortable period," Jones said. Fortunately, laws passed in the latter half of the 19th century helped put an end to it.

The images in this gallery are just a few of those on display, but they give a sense of anatomy through the ages – in all its creepy and disconcerting beauty.